SOUTHWARDS IN SONG

did I say the time we wrote a song together in the old green ’51 Chevy driving down to
San Francisco? dad actually grinning at the wheel and I the big boy riding co-pilot
with great maps spread across my happy lap, the day unfolding like a fan of peacock
feathers through the bug stained windshield, leaving Portland at 3 or 4 in the morning


because we all were too excited to sleep and so let's pile in the car and head south
through the dark night and the many miles into the magical beautiful arching city
and the Golden Gate---


Oh! the Golden Gate, you orange sun emerging strong and sudden from bluest sky
over infinite waters! and our chorus of song belting out ‘California Here We Come’
crossing the great bridge which seemed to represent happiness or a kind of freedom
not known at home—


and smiles, there were true smiles and laughter spontaneous like a fountain bursting
from us then in the packed car. yes we had these family vacation times when the
screaming and god-awful tensions of sad desultory lamentations at home dissipated


for a blessed week or two at a blessed time and I looked at him soft and breathed in my
father's face and being, then even his eyes were soft too, he was a good and safe man
for this while who loved me and his life, which was not always the case back north


in the grim unforgiving rain and the day to day of worry and wear and shoes left out on
living room floors by seven year old ungrateful bastards, this may tell why I shall always
love the city of steep hills on the bay with its Chinatown, beatnik bookstores, Italian


coffeehouses and romantic cable cars pulling us higher and higher towards a slice of
heaven where ease and joy and even singing at the table over pasta and bread with real
butter in the comforting smooth wooden booths of North Beach prevail without threat of
punishment or shame.